You're Dead to Me, Pope Clement VI

6th December 1352.

When the Black Death first struck Europe in 1347, Pope Clement VI attributed the pandemic to the wrath of God because, well, he was the Pope, right? I say he was the Pope, but he was, of course, one of the Popes, for as well as having a disease of great pestilence laying waste to the ravaged poor of Europe, it also had to deal with two Popes at once. One in Rome and one in the beautiful medieval city of Avignon. Visit Avignon today, and I suggest you do, and you'll find a vibrant city dominated by the famous bridge - or the half of it that remains - the grand medieval walls and the looming, dark, mysterious, yet utterly magnificent gothic sprawl of the Pope's Palace.

Clement lit torches to hold back the disease and consulted astrologers, although, to be fair to him, he stayed in Avignon and administered to the sick and dying. Things got so bad that, eventually, they ran out of cemetery space to bury the dead, and Clement took the bold step of consecrating the Rhône River so that it could be considered holy ground and bodies could be thrown into it to become some other bastard's problem.

Clement managed to avoid the plague, presumably like it was the plague, and instead managed to find the usual bunch of ne'er-do-wells to put the blame on - the Jews.

As a Benedictine, the party boys of medieval monkery, Clement was fond of a drink and a bit of a shindig. He spent the papacy's considerable wealth on fine dining, paintings, tapestries, new buildings and music. He kept a stable of musicians and composers with him at all times and recruited the finest artistes from across France. In his own words, he claimed to have "lived as a sinner among sinners".

By 1352, Clement had been ill for some time with kidney stones that caused him excruciating pain. He had seen death coming for some time and had built himself a glorious tomb at the abbey of La Chaise-Dieu that cost a whopping 3,500 florins to construct. He developed a tumour on his arm, which burst and leaked foul-smelling liquid, and in December, he retired to his bed for the last time with a fever from which he was not to recover.

On his passing, his Almoner, Pierre de Froideville, distributed the sum of 400 livres to the poor of Avignon, and on the day of the funeral, another 40 livres were distributed to the poor who were present along the route to the cathedral. According to the medieval historian Ferdinand Gregorovius, Clement was "a fine gentleman, a prince munificent to profusion, a patron of the arts and learning, but no saint".

He lay in state in the Notre Dame-des-Doms, the church next to the Pope's Palace for a few weeks and then was buried in the same church. Some three months later, the body was transferred in a lavish procession to La Chaise-Dieu, and the coffin was placed in the church of the Carmelites. In April of the following year, he was placed in his spectacular marble tomb with forty-four statues of Clement's relatives surrounding the sarcophagus.

In 1562, the tomb was attacked by the rather grumpy Huguenots and badly damaged. Only the marble sarcophagus lid remains.

Thanks for reading! If you’re stuck for a Christmas gift for a loved one, or for someone you hate, or if you have a table with a wonky leg that would benefit from the support of 341 pages of Roman History, my new book “The Compendium of Roman History” is available on Amazon right now! Please check it out by clicking the link below!